The Church Histories, hitherto
in dealing with early Christian literature, have given Aristides along
with Quadratus the first place in the list of lost apologists. It
was known that there had been such early defenders of the faith, and
that Quadratus had seen persons who had been miraculously healed by
Christ; but beyond this little more could be said. To Justin
Martyr, who flourished about a.d. 150, belonged
the honour of heading the series of apologists whose works are extant,
viz., Tatian, Melito, Athenagoras, Theophilus, the author of the
Epistle to Diognetus, who all belonged to the second century and wrote
in Greek; and Tertullian, Minucius Felix, Arnobius, and Lactantius, who
wrote in Latin, and Clement and Origen who wrote in Greek, during the
third century. While Christianity was winning its way to
recognition in the Roman empire, these writers tried to disprove the
gross calumnies current about Christians, to enlighten rulers and
magistrates as to the real character and conduct of the adherents of
the new religion, and to remove the prejudice which led to the violent
persecutions of the populace. They also endeavoured to commend
Christianity to “the cultured among its despisers,” by
showing that it is philosophy as well as revelation, that it can supply
the answers sought by philosophy, and is unlike human wisdom in being
certain because divinely revealed. At the same time they
demonstrated the folly of polytheism and pointed out its disastrous
effects on morality. This faithful company of the defenders of
the faith has now regained Aristides as their leader in place of Justin
Martyr. It will be well to recount briefly what was previously
known about Aristides, and to tell how the lost Apology has been
found.

Eusebius, in his History of the Church, written during
the reign of Constantine, a.d. 306–337,
has a chapter (bk. iv., c. 3) headed “The authors that wrote in
defence of the faith in the reign of Hadrian, a.d. 117–138.” After describing and
quoting the Apology of Quadratus, he adds:

“Aristides also, a man faithfully devoted to the
religion we profess, like Quadratus, has left to posterity a defence of
the faith, addressed to Hadrian. This work is also preserved by a
great number, even to the present day.”

The same Eusebius in his Chronicon states that
the Emperor Hadrian visited Athens in the eighth year of his reign
(i.e., a.d. 125 ) and took part in the
Eleusinian mysteries. In the same connection the historian
mentions the presentation of Apologies to the Emperor by Quadratus and
Aristides, “an Athenian philosopher;” and implies that
Hadrian was induced by these appeals, coupled with a letter from
Serenius Granianus, proconsul of Asia, to issue an Imperial rescript
forbidding the punishment of Christians without careful investigation
and trial.

About a century later Jerome (died a.d. 420) tells us that Aristides was a philosopher of
Athens, that he retained his philosopher’s garb after his
conversion to Christianity, and that he presented a defence of the
faith to Hadrian at the same time as Quadratus. This Apology, he
says, was extant in his day, and was largely composed of the opinions
of philosophers (“contextum philosophorum sententiis”), and
was afterwards imitated by Justin Martyr.

After this date Aristides passes out of view. In
the mediæval martyrologies there is a faint reflection of the
earlier testimony, as, e.g., the 31st of August is given as the
saint’s 260day “of the
blessed Aristides, most renowned for faith and wisdom, who presented
books on the Christian religion to the prince Hadrian, and most
brilliantly proclaimed in the presence of the Emperor himself how that
Christ Jesus is the only God.”

In the seventeenth century there were rumours that the
missing Apology of Aristides was to be found in various monastic
libraries in Greece; and Spon, a French traveller, made a fruitless
search for it. The book had apparently disappeared for ever.

But in recent times Aristides has again “swum into
our ken.” Armenian literature, which has done service to
Christendom by preserving so many of its early documents, supplied also
the first news of the recovery of Aristides. In the Mechitarite
convent of S. Lazarus at Venice there is a body of Armenian monks who
study Armenian and other literature. In 1878 these Armenians
surprised the learned world by publishing a Latin translation of an
Armenian fragment (the first two chapters) of the lost Apology of
Aristides. Renan at once set it down as spurious because it
contained theological terms of a later age, e.g., “bearer of
God” applied to the Virgin Mary. These terms were
afterwards seen to be due to the translator. At what time the
translation from Greek into Armenian was made is not apparent; but it
may reasonably be connected with the work begun by the famous Armenian
patriarch Mesrobes. This noble Christian invented an alphabet for
his country, established schools, and sent a band of young Armenians to
Edessa, Athens, and elsewhere with instructions to translate into
Armenian the best sacred and classical books. And in spite of
Mohammedans and Turks Armenia has remained Christian, and now restores
to the world the treasures committed to its keeping in the early
centuries.

Opinions as to the Armenian fragment of Aristides
remained undecided till 1889. In the spring of that year
Professor J. Rendel Harris, of Cambridge, had the honour of discovering
a Syriac version of the whole Apology in the library of the Convent of
St. Catharine, on Mount Sinai. He found the Apology of Aristides
among a collection of Syriac treatises of an ethical character; and he
refers the ms. to the seventh century.
Professor Harris has translated the Syriac into English, and has
carefully edited the Syriac text with minute discussions of every point
of interest.44134413Texts and
Studies. Contributions to Biblical and Patristic
Literature. Edited by J. A. Robinson, B.D. Vol. i., No. 1,
the Apology of Aristides, edited and translated by J. Rendel
Harris, M.A., with an Appendix by J. A. Robinson, B.D. (Cambridge
University Press.)

The recovery of the Syriac version by Professor Harris
placed the genuineness of the Armenian fragment beyond question.
It also led to the strange reappearance of the greater part of the
original Greek. Professor J. A. Robinson, the general editor of
the Cambridge Texts and Studies, having read the translation of
the Syriac version, discovered that the Apology of Aristides is
incorporated in the early Christian Romance entitled, The Life of
Barlaam and Josaphat.

Some account must be given of this remarkable book in
order to show its connection with the Apology of Aristides. Its
author is said to be John of Damascus, who died about a.d. 760. Whoever wrote it, the book soon became very
popular. In the East it was translated into Arabic, Ethiopic,
Armenian, and Hebrew; in the West there are versions of it in nearly a
dozen languages, including an English metrical rendering. As
early as 1204 a king of Norway had it translated into Icelandic.
It is now known to be the story of Buddha in a Christian setting,
furnished with fables and parables which have migrated from the far
East and can be traced back to an extreme antiquity.

The outline of the story is as follows: A king in
India, Abenner by name, who is an enemy of the Christians, has an only
son Josaphat (or Joasaph). At his birth the astrologers predict
that he will become great, but will embrace the new doctrine. To
prevent this, his father surrounds the prince with young and beautiful
attendants, and takes care that Josaphat shall see nothing of illness,
old age, or death. At length Josaphat desires his freedom, and
then follow the excursions as in the case of Buddha. Josaphat
seeing so much misery possible in life is sunk in despair. In
this state he is visited by a Christian hermit—Barlaam by
name. Josaphat is converted to Christianity, and Barlaam
withdraws again to the desert.

To undo his son’s conversion the king arranges
that a public disputation shall be held; one of the king’s sages,
Nachor by name, is to personate Barlaam and to make a very weak
statement of the Christian case, and so be easily refuted by the court
orators. When the day comes, the prince Josaphat charges Nachor,
the fictitious monk, to do his best on pain of torture. Thus
stimulated, Nachor begins, and “like Balaam’s ass he spake
that which 261he had not purposed to
speak; and he said, ‘I, O king, in the providence of God,’
etc.” He then recites the Apology of Aristides to such
purpose that he converts himself, the king, and all his people.
Josaphat finally relinquishes his kingdom, and retires into the desert
with the genuine Barlaam for prayer and meditation. Not only so,
but the churches of the Middle Ages, forgetting the fabulous character
of the story, raised Barlaam and Josaphat to the rank of saints, with a
holy day in the Christian calendar. Thus the author of Barlaam
and Josaphat caused Christianity unwittingly to do honour to the
founder of Buddhism under the name of St. Josaphat; and also to read
the Apology of Aristides in nearly twenty languages without suspecting
what it was.

The speech of Nachor in Greek, that is to say, the
greater part of the original Greek of the Apology of Aristides, has
been extracted from this source by Professor Robinson and is published
in Texts and Studies, Vol. I., so that there is now abundant
material for making an estimate of Aristides.

It may be asked whether we have in any of our three
sources the actual words of Aristides. The circumstances under
which the Apology was incorporated in The Life of Barlaam and
Josaphat are such as to render it unlikely that the author of the
Romance should copy with the faithfulness of a scribe; but examination
proves that very few modifications hare been made. The Greek
divides men into three races (the Syriac and Armenian into four); the
introductory accounts of these races are in the Greek blended with the
general discussion; and at the close the description of early Christian
customs is shortened. These few differences from the Syriac are
all explained by the fact that the Apology had to be adapted to the
circumstances of an Indian court in a later age. On the other
hand, when the Syriac is compared. with the Greek and Armenian in
passages where these two agree, it is found that explanatory clauses
are added; and there is throughout a cumbrous redundancy of pronouns in
the Syriac. In short, the actual words of Aristides may be
restored with tolerable certainty—a task which has been already
accomplished by a German scholar, Lic. Edgar Hennecke.44144414DieApologie des Aristides. Recension und Rekonstruktion des Textes, von Lic. Edgar
Hennecke. (Die Griechischen Apologeten: Heft
3.) In any case we have the substance of
the Apology of Aristides with almost verbal precision.

In regard to the date of Aristides, Eusebius says
expressly that the Apology was presented to Hadrian while he was in
Athens about the year a.d. 125. The only
ground for questioning this statement is the second superscription
given in the Syriac version, which implies that the Apology was
presented to Antoninus Pius, a.d.
138–161. This heading is accepted by Professor Harris as
the true one; and he assigns the Apology to “the early years of
the reign of Antoninus Pius; and it is at least conceivable,” he
adds, “that it may have been presented to the Emperor along with
other Christian writings during an unrecorded visit of his to his
ancient seat of government at Smyrna.” But this requires us
to suppose that Eusebius was wrong; that Jerome copied his error; that
the Armenian version curiously fell into the same mistake; and that the
Syriac translator is at this point exceptionally faithful. So
perhaps it is better with Billius, “not to trust more in
one’s own suspicions, than in Christian charity which believeth
all things,” and to rest in the comfortable hypothesis that
Eusebius spoke the truth.

Writing in a.d. 125, or even
twenty years later, Aristides becomes an important witness as to the
nature of early Christianity. His Apology contains no express
quotation from Scripture; but the Emperor is referred for information
to a gospel which is written. Various echoes of New Testament
expressions will at once be recognized; and “the language
moulding power of Christianity” is discernible in the new meaning
given to various classical words. Some topics are conspicuous by
their absence. Aristides has no trace of ill-feeling to the Jews;
no reference to the Logos doctrine, nor to the distinctive ideas of the
Apostle Paul; he has no gnosticism or heresy to denounce, and he makes
no appeal to miracle and prophecy. Christianity, in his view, is
worthy of a philosophic emperor because it is eminently reasonable, and
gives an impulse and power to live a good life. On the whole,
Aristides represents that type of Christian practice which is found in
the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles; and to this he adds a
simple Christian philosophy which may be compared with that of St. Paul
at Athens. Although the details about the elements and the
heathen gods are discussed with tedious minuteness, still his closing
section describing the lives of the early Christians should always be
good reading.

The translation of the Syriac given here is
independently made from the Syriac text, edited by Professor
Harris44154415 The Cambridge
Texts and Studies, vol. i., No. 1.. Full
advantage has been taken of his notes and apparatus
criti262cus, but no use has
been made of his translation. In obscure passages the German
translation of Dr. Richard Raabe44164416Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Altchristlichen
Litteratur, Gebhardt und Harnack, IX. Band, Heft
1. has been
compared; and the Text-Rekonstruktion of Hennecke has been
consulted on textual points in both translations. The Greek
translation is made from the text edited by Professor
Robinson.44174417 The Cambridge
Texts and Studies, vol. i., No. 1. The
translations from the Greek and from the Syriac are arranged side by
side, so that their relation to one another is apparent at a
glance. No attempt has been made to force the same English words
from passages which are evidently meant to be identical in the two
languages; but the literal tenour of each has been allowed to assert
itself.